Looking Presidential

Currently, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is thought of as the leading contender for the Democratic nomination in the Presidential race of 2016.
In class last week, my "team" strategized about how to help Ms Clinton capture the White House. While we weren't tasked with creating a television ad for her, I keep having visions of one.  It features....well, it features ME!  (Or people like me).

The Chris Christie team in class speculated that Secretary Clinton will be viewed by voters as too old for the job ("Over the Hill-ary").  On Election Day, 2016 she will be just a year away from her eighth decade, as will I.  So, to address such criticism, I recommend that one of her campaign's first ads  be designed to preempt the concerns of voters by showing strong, healthy, energetic contemporaries of the candidate engaged in robust activities such as skiing, house painting, gutter cleaning, running, driving a tractor, etc.  These people would take a break from their work (or play) in order to speak to the camera about feeling a kinship with Ms Clinton because of the similarity in their ages.  Maybe they could say, "70 is the new 50" or something like that.

Obviously, my comments here are a bit tongue-in-cheek, but I think there's a kernel of something useful there, should Secretary Clinton win her party's nomination.  I'd be happy to pose on my extension ladder if they need me.

On another note, the haircut and "makeover" my team suggested for Hillary is easily accomplished, unlike the 200+ pound weight loss challenge which is faced by Governor Christie.  Seriously, Mr. Christie is not simply overweight; he is morbidly obese.  His weight puts him at greatly increased risk of premature death.  There is no way that his situation can be spun into a positive.  The fact that a high percentage of Americans struggle with their weight will not translate into votes for Mr. Christie.

If both these individuals require transformation in order to be embraced by voters, my money's on Ms Clinton, not Mr. Christie, to successfully accomplish it.
               

  

Targeting Donors

The assigned reading this week has caused me to think back to all the emails I received on behalf of the President during election season.  If I got any which sought my vote, I don't recall them.  I think they were all looking for campaign contributions.  I suppose it's possible that I was in the data base as someone whose vote could be counted on (though I don't think I directly reported that in any "official" way).  They surely would also have had access to a record of my past financial contributions.

I received multiple emails which sought to prompt an additional contribution by promising that my name would be entered in a drawing which could result in an opportunity to have dinner with the Obamas.  I deleted them.  I did respond to a couple of emails which claimed that Mr. Romney was raising (and spending) more money than the Dems.  I responded to emails which identified a looming deadline of some sort; "We must raise $X by midnight tomorrow in order to..."
I ignored the ones, purportedly from Ms Obama, which asked me to "sign Barack's birthday card" and, oh, by the way, donate more money while you're at it.

So, what did the Obama campaign learn about me from their "interactions" with me?  I hope they learned that a chance to dine and schmooze with famous or otherwise "important" people is not the way to my heart (or wallet).  They might have learned that I am willing to help out when there is some threat to my candidate, when the other team seems to have the advantage in some way.  I wonder if next election season I will be bombarded with doomsday scenarios.
I guess time will tell.